


Encore

by bendingsignpost



Series: Tumblr Fic [12]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Circus, Blow Jobs, Closeted Castiel (Supernatural), First Meetings, Lust at First Sight, M/M, Performer Castiel (Supernatural), Period-Typical Homophobia, Thief Dean Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-29
Updated: 2019-04-29
Packaged: 2020-02-09 19:36:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18644713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bendingsignpost/pseuds/bendingsignpost
Summary: While the show goes on, Dean works behind the scenes.That doesn't mean he can't stop to watch.





	Encore

**Author's Note:**

  * For [oceanbluecas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/oceanbluecas/gifts).



> The prompt:  
> oceanbluecas said:  
> If you’re still doing these: 15, 18, Destiel?
> 
> 15\. Criminal AU  
> 18\. Circus AU

The acrobats are up, swinging from the tent posts and flying around the ceiling, and Dean’s not watching. Everyone else is, heads and eyes angled upward, and Dean is working as fast as he can. Slide a bag here, pull a wallet there. Return as many billfolds as possible, and don’t take  _all_  of the cash. Just enough that a man in a sharp suit might be confused over how much he’d spent. 

The docks might be rife with pickpockets, but Dean doesn’t want anyone thinking they’re being robbed  _during_ the show. Where’s he going to find another hunting ground like this?

When the fire breathers come on, Dean reflexively sinks deeper into the shadows beneath the stands. The light flickers between the slats of seats and steps, between trouser legs and under the hems of dresses. He makes the transition between the stands between acts, under the cover of applause. He ducks down again as stage hands pass behind him, again escaping detection. 

The ringmaster gets out in the limelight, ribbing the audience before announcing the next act. The name is as ridiculous—Castiel, Commander of Beasts—but Dean’s caught enough glimpses before that he stops working. The clanging as the huge, circular fence is brought out and assembled is fantastic cover, but Dean’s earned this break. Crouched down as low as he can get, Dean finds a good spot and watches the ring between a man’s widespread legs.

The lion tamer is as spectacular as his name is stupid. His uniform sparkles, a dazzle adorned in loops of rope and rows of shining buttons. His trousers cling to his legs, and not even the tails of his coat can conceal the shape of him. Tonight, he’s without his hat, but his hair alone makes up for it. He stands tall and proud inside the cage, trapped with only one exit: the metal tunnel of the lion’s entrance.

And then, to the sound of a mounting drum roll, they release the lion.

The beast barrels down into the ring, charging at Castiel’s back. Someone in the audience screams out for Castiel to turn, but the man only does so calmly, almost leisurely as the lion rears up, mere feet away, its huge paws raised high and coming down. 

Unflinching, undaunted, Castiel steps forward. Both paws slam on his shoulders, covering them completely, spilling over with hidden claws, and Castiel turns with the impact, one arm wrapped around the lion’s middle. His other hand deftly grabs the base of a paw and pulls it from his shoulder. He keeps turning, shuffling slightly, and the band breaks out into, of all things, a waltz. 

Mouth open, Dean rocks back onto his heels. He steadies himself, hands touching dirt strewn with peanut shells. Castiel and the lion... dance. Not well: it’s a new act, plainly so, but... 

Dean can’t stop staring. 

Not because of the fierceness of the animal. The beast looms over the man, its paws the size of his head, its head the size of his torso, its mane scraggly but still present. 

It’s Castiel. The stone-faced tamer who never pauses, never hesitates. 

He’s... smiling. 

Castiel tilts his head against the lion’s. They nuzzle, and that explains Castiel’s lack of hat tonight. It would’ve been knocked right off. 

From outside of the cage, the ringmaster shouts out some quip about dancing cheek to cheek, but Dean barely hears him, or the stunned laughter that follows. 

The act returns to normal after that, more or less. The hoops, the jumps, the standing and roaring. But this time, when Castiel opens the lion’s mouth and Dean’s heart jumps back up into his throat, Castiel only starts to put his head inside the lion’s mouth. 

Instead, Castiel startles back and waves a hand in front of his nose. To a roar of laughter from the crowd, he whips out a toothbrush from within his jacket and begins to scrub the animal’s teeth. 

What ensues is a routine nearly as slapstick as the clowns, the lion sulking away and Castiel pursuing with hands on hips, as stern as any mother chiding her child. 

“It’s a late night and time for bed!” the ringmaster proclaims as Castiel finishes his task. Castiel leads the lion back to the raised platform in the center of the ring. He points and mimes sleeping, but the lion just sits there, eyes on him. He gets the lion to jump up, joins it, but when he holds up a blanket, the lion jumps down and runs around the ring instead. 

Castiel puts his hands back on his hips, turning to track the lion’s progress. Dean sinks back into the shadows as the lion crosses in front of him. It’s not fear of the creature but of the man seeing. As it is, even the faint sensation of Castiel’s eyes crossing over where Dean has secreted himself away, even that is shiver-inducing. 

Finally, Castiel throws up his hands. He lies down, pulls the blanket over himself, and doesn’t move, his back once again turned toward the lion. 

The lion comes back. It jumps back up on the platform while everyone waits with baited breath. It sniffs at Castiel before lying down half on top of him, inspecting Castiel very closely indeed and sniffing at his shoulders. 

Then, in a motion as fluid as it is petulant, the lion bites the blanket and rolls over, whipping the blanket off Castiel and onto itself. 

Castiel stands, the audience cheers, and Castiel shushes them all, much to their resulting laughter. 

The act over, he leads the lion out. 

There’s another transition, the cage being taken down while the ringmaster gets back to talking, but Dean’s already moving. It’s been good pickings tonight, and he can always come back. He goes without knowing why—telling himself he doesn’t know why—and once he’s out of the tent and behind the scenes, he takes on the gait of someone who has every right to be there. 

Looking around is difficult when trying not to look out of place, but Dean manages. His clothing is just good enough to be respectable, old enough to fit in. He heads to the warehouse where he knows they keep the props. Pre-show, there’s good pickings there, sometimes a bit of a crowd watching to see what’s being taken out and what’s left behind. From there, he’s not really sure what he’s doing. 

Inside, a woman in glittering makeup stops him, but Dean hears himself says something about “notes from the boss on the new lion act.”

She nods, still eyeing him. “Uh-huh. Which is why you want to be heading to the  _men’s_  dressing room.” She points, clearly suspicious for the wrong reason, and Dean takes the excuse with a wink and a fast walk away. 

He gets all the way to the dressing room. 

His feet stop, finally matching his brain. 

_But_ , is his one thought at stopping. 

_But_ , is the protest at turning back. 

The door opens. 

The shining uniform is gone, but Castiel’s face is the same. His hair is even more mussed, and he looks healthier out of the stage lights. More tan, more hearty. Surprisingly, he’s an inch shorter than Dean. His eyes, it turns out, are blue. 

They’re also aimed at Dean, and full of recognition. 

“You? What are you doing here?” Castiel asks. 

“Me?” Dean repeats dumbly. “We know each other?” If Castiel isn’t his real name, maybe they’ve met before. Maybe it’s the shine and the lights that disguised him. Maybe this stupid, idiotic feeling in Dean’s chest has some rational cause. 

“I’ve seen you,” Castiel says, still standing in the doorway. “Tonight, you were between a man’s legs.”

Stomach dropping, Dean reacts on instinct. He plants a hand on Castiel’s chest. He pushes against firm muscle and pulls the door shut behind them. He pulls a lewd grin across his face. 

“Where are you spending your time, seeing stuff like that?” Dean asks. 

Castiel blanches, but his eyes darken. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Yeah, you do,” Dean says, now sure of it. “It’s not just male lions you dance with, huh.”

“Her name is Hannah,” Castiel retorts. 

Dean’s grin slips. “What?”

“My lion. She started growing a mane, I don’t know why.”

They stare at each other, surrounded by racks of costumes and rows of mirrors. 

“Oh,” Dean says, his certainty sliding away after his grin. 

The staring match continues. 

Finally, Castiel breaks the silence, taking in a deep breath. “If you’re here to blackmail me-”

“What,” Dean says again. 

Castiel’s jaw works. 

The penny drops. The knot in Dean’s stomach unties itself. 

“You do like men,” Dean says, keeping it quiet, staying in a whisper. 

Castiel glares like the devil himself, but he doesn’t deny it. 

Involuntary, Dean licks his lips. “I’m- I watch you. In the show. And it’s... You’re...” He licks his lips again, tongue impossibly dry. 

Dean takes a step forward, into Castiel’s space.

Castiel doesn’t step back. 

“Do you want to see me between a man’s legs?” Dean asks. “You don’t turn me in, I don’t breathe a word to anybody, and we all go to bed happy.”

Eyes fixed on Dean’s mouth, Castiel takes a careful moment responding. “I... live upstairs.”

“Let’s go upstairs.”

Faintly, Castiel shakes his head. “I need to...” But he shifts forward. This close, he doesn’t even need to move his feet. 

Dean’s hands rise, cupping Castiel’s face to greet a tentative touch with a warm welcome. He pushes into Castiel’s mouth, and Castiel opens with a deep noise of surprise, as if he’d forgotten what pleasure tasted like. 

Dean shows him. 

When Castiel breaks the kiss, it isn’t to pull away. If anything, his hands on Dean’s waist pull him closer, hold them together tighter. He rests his forehead against Dean’s. Their noses brush. 

“I need to take care of Hannah for the night,” Castiel murmurs. 

“I could wait in your room.”

“And rob me blind.”

“I could watch while you work.”

“Hannah might not like that. She’s very protective of me.”

Dean doesn’t show fear. It’s not something he does. He puts on another grin instead. “She’ll barely notice I’m there.”

Castiel looks at him with weakening indecision. His hands tighten against Dean’s hips. “You’re very beautiful,” he says, as if that’s something people say to each other. As if that was a natural continuation of the conversation. “I think anyone would notice you.”

Oh. 

“Hope not,” Dean jokes, voice rough. 

Castiel kisses him again, hard. This time, it lasts. It twists, working higher and tighter before Castiel pulls away and drags Dean behind the racks of costumes, behind coat racks and props. “Just this,” Castiel says, speaking as if he’s making a promise more to himself than to Dean. “I’ll see you out afterward, and you’ll stop coming.”

“I’d rather start,” Dean says, and Castiel flushes. 

Dean takes the opportunity to turn them, to steer Castiel to sit down against the wall atop a closed steamer trunk in the shadows. He kneels.

“Can you stay quiet?” Dean asks, already pulling at Castiel’s trousers. He doesn’t bother to be careful, using faux-clumsy fingers as a tease. 

Nostrils flared, neck stiff, Castiel nods. He unbuttons his shirt, shucks it, and pushes his suspenders down, leaving only his undershirt. He hastens Dean’s fumble. He lifts his hips, and Dean pulls. Dean only gets the trousers down to above Castiel’s hips, but they shove the discarded shirt under his bare ass for a tiny piece of comfort. 

Dean lifts the undershirt to kiss his stomach first. Castiel sinks further down the wall. His trouser-bound legs push at Dean’s middle, a worse tease than Dean could ever be. 

Trailing his mouth lower, Dean prepares Castiel with gentle hands, too aware of his rough palms to rush. Castiel’s hard, but Dean can get him harder, and that’s all before the first touch of his lips or tongue. He slicks Castiel down from the head, and his mouth follows his hand. 

Each of Castiel’s choked breaths are as good as a moan. 

The hitch of his lungs. The twitch of his hips. The helpless way his hands card through Dean’s hair but can never quite seem to push down on his head. 

The changing room door opens. 

Dean freezes, cock still in his mouth. He looks up through the shadows. Castiel, eyes dark and panicked, stares back down. His cock stays hard between Dean’s lips. 

They stay like that. Dean breathing through his nose. Castiel biting the side of his hand. Dean starts to drool around him, and he only moves to wipe his mouth. 

Throughout, the newcomer hums something to himself, the same snatch of song over and over again, like he’s got it caught in his head but doesn’t know the rest. 

Dean’s knees feel the ache of the floor. His jaw begs to close. His dick demands to be freed from his pants. 

After an eternity, the man leaves. 

Dean resumes with a vengeance, but the tension has already done its job. Castiel stiffens immediately, spilling soundlessly, one hand spasming on Dean’s shoulder. Dean swallows as fast as he can, throat working around Castiel’s cockhead, and Castiel finally breaks, letting out this desperate little sigh of a moan. 

Dean pulls off, wipes his mouth, and blinks at the offered handkerchief. He spits, wipes his mouth with one corner, and wipes his hands with another. “Thanks,” he says, voice rough for obvious reasons. 

“I should have warned you,” Castiel murmurs in response. “But it...”

“Timing, yeah,” Dean whispers back.

Dean stands on shaking, aching legs, and Castiel’s eyes follow the bulge of his crotch. 

Dean opens his fly, and Castiel leans forward. It’s a fumbling, shifting mess, Dean trying to press into his mouth and Castiel trying to get onto the floor. They end up a few feet to the left, Castiel kneeling beside the steamer trunk, Dean’s hands planted on the wall. 

He fucks into Castiel’s mouth. He braces a forearm against the wall, drops his head against it, and makes himself open his eyes to see the shadowy sight of Castiel taking him. 

Dean tries to last. He swears he does. 

But Castiel. 

At Dean’s fucking feet. 

Lingering on Dean’s tongue. 

Pulling at Dean with lips and hand. 

It surges up too fast. 

“I’m gonna,” Dean warns.

Still stroking, Castiel pulls off. Reaches for the used hanky. 

And Dean comes all over his undershirt. 

“Fuck,” Dean swears. He sinks to his knees. He grabs at Castiel’s shoulders. An apology sticks behind his teeth, the sight of his come across even that clothed chest too much. 

With only a faint sigh, Castiel strips his shirt off, and then Dean can’t talk at all. 

There’s kissing instead. 

Before someone else can come into the dressing room, they clean up. Castiel’s undershirt gets turned inside out into a little bundle he ties shut with his folded hanky, an innocuous piece of laundry. Castiel wears his suspenders over his shirt now, and he pulls on a jacket to escort Dean out. 

“This was the one time,” Castiel tells him in lieu of goodbye. “We’re not doing this again.”

“Sure thing,” Dean says, walking away, walking backward. He winks. “Seeya tomorrow.”

**Author's Note:**

> As always, to see what else I'm working on, you can follow me on [tumblr here](http://bendingsignpost.tumblr.com/) or [dreamwidth here](http://https://bendingsignpost.dreamwidth.org/).


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